Sunday, February 8, 2009

Valentine's Day is almost here (guys, I hope you have it on your calendar - February 14!) and it's time to think not only how to do something nice for your loved once, but also how to do it in a green way.

One place where you can always go green and save paper is wrapping. Did you know that in the U.S., an additional 5 million tons of waste is generated during the holidays and four million tons of this is wrapping paper and shopping bags?

So what you can do? well, there are many ways to make packaging more eco-friendly. If you look for a specific recommendation, one company that is also taking steps about it is Wishrap.com

The new bags and boxes for these gifts are made of a natural jute fiber - a plant that is harvested and grows faster than bamboo and in a smaller footprint. The included cards and tissue are made of post-consumer recycled paper and the boxes and bags are reusable, designed with practicality in mind so that they can be reused over and over again. The boxes are collapsible, great for storage, and the bags make great reusable totes.

Wishwrap.com is a unique gift site that puts the thoughtfulness back into gift giving. Every Wishwrap gift comes with a custom greeting card created especially for the recipient and is "wishwrapped" in luxurious packaging at no extra cost. The two featured Valentine's Day packages will be the first to ship in the new green packaging, which will then be transitioned in for all packages.

For further details on their offers please visit their website at www.wishwrap.com.

And we have a special giveaway!

Wishrap.com are giving away cool set of plantable greeting cards. Each card is handprinted with soy-based ink on 100% recycled paper embedded with seeds. The card itself is biodegradable and can be planted in the backyard or a community garden, all set to flourish. The set includes two cards with wildflowers and a third with basil and chives.

To get a chance to win this cool prize please add a comment to this post with the best gift you gave or received for Valentine's Day.

Submissions are accepted until Valentine's Day, February 14, 12PM EST. We will pick the comment we liked best and the winner will be announced the following day.

If people want to get serious (and cleaner) about the environment then they should get a Bathroom Bidet Sprayer from www.bathroomsprayers.com and you won't even need toilet paper anymore, just a towel to dry off! It's cheap and can be installed without a plumber; and runs off the same water line to your toilet. . You'll probably pay for it in a few months of toilet paper savings. And after using one of these you won't know how you lasted all those years with wadded up handfuls of toilet paper, nasty. Now we're talking green and helping the environment without any pain.

ebooks vs. paper books:

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read!

Founded in 2007, Eco-Libris is a green company working to green up the book industry in the digital age by promoting the adoption of green practices in the book industry, balancing out books by planting trees, and helping to make e-reading greener.

To achieve these goals Eco-Libris is working with book readers, publishers, authors, bookstores and others in the book industry worldwide. So far Eco-Libris balanced out over 179,500 books, which results in more than 200,000 new trees planted with its planting partners in developing countries.